From about 1997 through 2003, I identified as poly. Ah, labels. I suppose I was sort of a bi-poly-sub. I kind of prefer to be label-less. Anyhow, it was all fairly awesome being poly for the most part. I did find that I was really more of a serial monogamist within poly, where I had one main interest at a time, at least sexually. I did play quite a bit non-sexually with more than one partner at a time though, and was happily friends with my partner’s partners. I met my best friend in the world, to this day, because we shared a partner.

Around 2001, it started going off the rails for me – I found that I had zero contentment. Sometimes if you view the world as everyone being “fair game” (or at least most of them) it’s worse than being single. At any rate, I was unhappy, antsy, just discontent.

When I met Elliott, we talked about the options quite a bit. We went to a couple of swinger parties, we went to a few events in my former sex-pos circle. We decided though that we were happier being monogamous, at least for now. Well, that “for now” has now been 8 years. Every once in awhile we revisit the idea, only to find that we still would rather carve out more time for each other in our busy lives, than to put that energy elsewhere. This always remains open to discussion in the future, of course, by either of us.

So I made the flip comment on the way to the airport for Momentum that it’d be “more interesting” if I was still poly. We laughed about it a bit, and I sort of thought I meant it. I was surprised, however, to find that it was just the opposite. I LOVED being monogamous at the con. With no desire to “cruise”, and no expectation to have anything happen, I actually found myself enjoying both the people I met and the conference itself far more than such things in the past. This isn’t to say that I didn’t find people attractive, I did. A couple of people in particular. But I find that I really enjoy getting to be around people I like and find attractive, with no expectation or need for a physical connection to actually occur. I can focus more on them, on the conversations, and so on when part of my brain isn’t wandering off to “what if?” land.

Is that weird? If it is, I’m ok with that.

I also found it interesting to read blog posts from other attendees after the con. Who felt insecure, who had tons of action, etc. Here’s a note: I believe pretty much everyone feels some insecurity. I know I did, just with introducing myself to people and trying to mingle. The rules are a bit different in this community than in the one I call home. I found myself accidentally touching people in conversation, say on the arm or whatever, without permission. A big no, but one I’ve become accustomed to not being a big deal in my current life. I apologized for it when I caught myself doing it, but it was still interesting to me that something so commonly accepted in my current social circle was something to keep checking myself on. I liked the other huggy/touchy people (here’s looking at you, Reid and Jamye) because that is my comfort zone.

I also realized that I have the same hard time reading people that I’ve always had in this community. I’m shy, yet my actual personality when I’m even remotely comfortable with people is effusive and chatty. I felt sometimes that people were looking at me like I had two heads when I’d act like myself. In short, I have a hard time feeling like I fit in most of the time. But that’s ok, it’s nice to be outside of my comfort zone occasionally for two reasons. The first is growth and experiences, the second is appreciating more what I have created for myself in my current life.

and look at me blogging, a whole two days in a row. :)

~Jane

So what is my latest ridiculous thing, you might ask? Well, there are two of them.

1. jewelry. I dabbled in making jewelry a few years back, and have taken basic silversmithing classes and so on. Running my retail shop, which sold a lot of cool art jewelry, gave me the bug again. This time around I’m learning more soldering and so on, but also teaching myself PMC (precious metal clay) firing, lampworking beads, etc. Haven’t had much time to do anything, but now that sailing season is mostly over I can set aside more time.

2. primal 30 day challenge! I’ve mentioned briefly having mostly converted to eating “primal” or “paleo”. It’s basically “no grain, no sugar”, which is a bit different from other low carb things. Anyhow, I’ve been pretty good about it and I feel way better, but next week one of the sites I follow is doing a 30 day “challenge” and for the first time I’m going to include the workout part of it too. Eek! Actually NOT eek, because primal doesn’t call for tons of cardio, which is the only part of exercise that I hate. (Can you believe I trained for a tri with that attitude? heh) So starting the 12th, I’ll be doing that. Happily, I have a friend who wants to do it too. Nice to have the company and the workout partner. :)

I can’t wait to post some jewelry photos as I get some things done. Hopefully they’ll turn out pretty enough that I’ll want to post them. And maybe, just maybe, I’ll post some before/after primal photos, or recipes.

I cannot tell you how much this has drastically changed my mood. It was such a long time coming, because basically I had to admit to myself that I was failing at doing everything, and that it didn’t make me a terrible person. I am not sure why I have this instilled belief that housekeeping has to be entirely on me, but I do. My own mother did stay at home when we were kids, up until I was 15 and my father died, however she had no housekeeping skills whatsoever, so this did not mean that she necessarily instilled in me a belief that housework was either A. important or B. fulfilling. In fact, quite the opposite, and yet I had enormous guilt and self-esteem issues tied up in my inability to keep my home nice.

Anyhow, it all came about when I had an old friend visit for the first time in probably 6 years. She got here for a visit right as we were transitioning to new office space, after having worked from home for a couple of years. For the three weeks before she arrived, I was almost never home. I turned a blind eye to everything there, and was totally unprepared for her visit, to the point of having to find clean sheets to make the guestroom up only AFTER she’d gotten there.

We had a perfectly lovely visit, and then on our way to the airport the final morning she suggested gently, and with the nicest of intentions that I should hire some help. I was completely mortified because I’d wanted her to have a good visit, and then I was embarrassed in the extreme that she’d been subjected to our household chaos, but I am grateful that she said it. We talked about it for a few minutes, and I threw out all of my usual reasons for not doing it.

Elliott wouldn’t like the privacy disruption. (I actually thought this, but as it turns out, he had no such qualms.)

It’s too expensive, how can I mentally justify that? (I get a massage about twice a month, mani/pedis twice a month, hair salon every 6 weeks, so really, I’m going to use that?)

I should be doing it all myself, shouldn’t I? (I work 50+ hours at the office, volunteer several more hours per week, and have the competitive sailing hobby. When am I doing this?)

And if not, shouldn’t my three teenagers be pitching in more? (I’ve found from experience that the job of getting them to do housework takes roughly the same amount of time and energy as doing it myself.)

After thinking about it for a few days, I was having a conversation with a friend about it, and it turns out ANOTHER friend of ours was in the midst of a start-up cleaning business. And so, I finally broke down and did what I should have done about two years ago, when life became truly busy. I got help. It’s only maybe 3-4 hours a week, and at this point I’ve limited it to the lower floor, but the difference it’s made in my life is phenomenal. I no longer feel stressed out upon entering my home after an 8-10 hour day. I no longer have an issue with impromptu dinner invitations to friends, because I know a disaster doesn’t await, and I won’t have to clean for a full day just to make it look passable. It’s amazing to me that so few hours can make this big a difference.

(In case you are reading, thanks S. for the nudge I needed to do this. I’m grateful.)

~Janie

A few years ago, Elliott had an awesome office manager/personal assistant, Fifi. (I am not making up the name – she went by Fifi, although she was as far from the stereotype that brought to mind as it was possible to be.) She somehow managed to get everything under control, and it certainly seemed that she brought the whole business back from the brink of disorganized collapse. Then she moved to Hawaii.

For the first year after she left, Elliott sort of mourned her going. He also secretly hoped that she’d have a change of heart and move back. They still keep in touch, and she still would work for him again if she ended up in this part of the country. Finally after it became apparent that 1. she was not coming back and 2. Elliott was never going to get around to finding a new Fifi, I started to fill in. At first it was just doing a bit of bookkeeping to keep his head above water. Then it became that and phone calls. Over time it became a full time job.

Earlier this year, Elliott’s company bought a couple of other small companies. All of a sudden I was phone support and bookkeeping for 3 separate businesses (at least until we can merge them all into one.) All of a sudden it was even MORE than a full time job. It was then that things started to deteriorate. No creative time. No housework time. A bit of recreational time, but not as much. And with way too much stress, we started sniping at each other way too much.

Anyhow, I am rambling on about it, so long story short: Elliott hired a new Fifi today! (Ok, so her name isn’t Fifi, what would be the odds?) She’s going to start in the next couple of weeks, and I am going to phase myself back out of his business and into my own again, and I couldn’t be happier. No more phone calls, which I detest. No more working together, except in the bigger picture ways. Now we can do what we did for the first half of our relationship, which is each do our own thing, while being supportive of the other. Yay!

Expect to see more of me around here… :)

~Jane

I used to “blog” practically daily. I didn’t call it that, I called it “journaling” because that’s what we all called it then. Writing became journaling, because journaling denoted (to me, at least) that it was personal, perhaps unpolished. But then journaling became too much of an effort, and “blogging” took over. Blogging (again, to me at least) signified that it was even shorter entries, little snippets of what we were thinking about. Blogging became linking to other people, other articles, with the occasional personal entry thrown in. Recently, I saw acquaintance write that he thought blogging was dead. Twitter was where it was at. You see the progression. It’s really not so different from the way media of all kinds has gone. Quantity in favor of quality, “aggregating” in favor of actually producing real content.

The other day, I was interviewed by our local newspaper for something very unrelated to this site. The interviewer showed up with no photographer, though they wanted photos. He took 3 photos with his iPhone. There is no budget for generating content anymore. It’s all syndicated from AP or Reuters.

It’s gone so far that I no longer care what people say, I just want them to SAY SOMETHING, not republish or link to other people’s words. I can agree or disagree, maybe even debate. I just want to read something original no matter what it is. Something that isn’t “safe”, and when I use that word, I mean something that isn’t either A. so watered down that it couldn’t possibly offend, or B. something so tailored to the chosen audience that it couldn’t generate dissent.

I don’t think blogging is dead. I am sick of twitter. When I tweet, I can never get enough words in to not have my few words misinterpreted, even to myself when I read them later. I can’t get to know somebody via tweets. I very rarely read anything thought provoking, unless as I mentioned above, it’s a link to the words of someone else, in a much longer format.

In short, I am starting to miss blogging. Or journaling. I miss handwritten letters, thrown over for email. I miss a face to face conversation, switched out for reading status updates.

I can’t be alone in this.

~Jane

So: I’ve donated to his project and I’m hoping other people will go take a listen to some of his music, and then check out amazing prizes for donating. They go all the way from “free tshirt” to “Jim Bianco will marry you.” (I’m not kidding, check it out… heh)

Anyhow, there are only 3 days left (it gets funded on Friday the 17th) so check it out… go listen to some of his music! Donate!

p.s. if you go to his kickstarter.com page, you have to watch the video – it’s awesome. :)

Once we finally were underway, we had a nice trip. I ended up shopping for myself too, as well as all 3 girls, because we so rarely go to ‘the big city’ and it’s nice to take advantage of far greater selection of things. :) Still, it made for a long day – left the house around 9am, got back around 9pm.

Interesting note of the day: I was updating reviews and such, and found that the very community-building software we’ve been considering to power a JanesGuide user base was what was used in a site that LOST THEIR WHOLE USER DATABASE in a massive failure. This concerns me. I need to forward that info on, because I’d hate to get a user community going only to lose everything. Of course I have in-house awesomeness when it comes to tech, so I doubt that will be an issue. It’s a little thing called backing up your data. Still…

Today has been playing catch-up on phone calls, emails and everything else. Oh, and girl-maintenance. I have a mani/pedi in an hour, something that is important to me at least. :) While the time spent is beyond dull, I do love having pretty nails.

Anyhow, now that things are feeling normal again, I am trying to get my life back. To that end, I finally started swimming again today. I haven’t for more than a year – I’d started last year when Elliott was training for a triathlon, but when he had an injury and dropped out, I dropped out along with him. Don’t know why, really, as swimming is a pretty solitary endeavor even if you DO go with someone else. Hard to chat with your face in the water, right? So today was hard. Swimming is one of those things that feels awful when you’re just getting started. Your body feels sluggish and slow, and it’s thoroughly exhausting. I had to force myself to get through a mile. My normal workouts when I do this regularly are 3-4 miles, to give an idea of how far I’ve let things lapse.

Next up is figuring out what hobby I want to take up. I have started and discarded so many things over the years, most of them creative. Now I understand more of the whys of that, so I’m trying to pick my next focus carefully. I want to learn how to garden, which surprised the heck out of Elliott. I’ve never really lifted a finger outside, it’s never been my thing. But I started reading about permaculture landscaping and it sounds really cool! Elliott is really into saltwater aquariums, and he turned his former bleach tank into a self-sustaining ecosystem a couple of years ago. Permaculture is sort of the parallel of that, but in landscaping, not water. The idea is to work with nature, instead of against it, and plant the right things so that you can grow food, ornamentals and other things all together, in an earth-friendly way that won’t need extra care and resources like fertilizers, etc. I’m sure it’s going to be a big learning curve for someone who previously hasn’t done much more than plant some tomatoes. :)

Elliott is sick, the youngest has a bad cold (she passed her driver’s test on the 2nd time around, btw – now her drive is next week) and the middle daughter has a mystery ailment still yet to be diagnosed. Early next week she moves up from nurse practitioner to specialist. It’s a helpless feeling when your child has a malady that is making her sad and stressed and in a bit of pain, but is not an immediately apparent diagnosis. All we can do is wait.

Then, on another note, we are trying to figure out immigration law. A very close friend of the girls, who feels like family now after 4+ years, is an undocumented immigrant. I believe that is the current phrasing, anyhow. Short story: he was brought here when he was a minor, knowing not a word of English. Against all odds and any type of family support for it, he stayed in school, became one of the rising stars in high school sports, and as I said, practically a member of my family. He feels like an American, he’s been here half his life. And yet, now that he’s turned 18, he’s “illegal”. There are things that are in the works, like the DREAM ACT that has been stuck for awhile in legislation. It’s a pretty cool thing, because it addresses his exact situation: he was brought here as a child, when he had no say. Now, years later, he has no (legal) future and is in-between cultures. He wants to go to college, become a chef, could probably get a sports scholarship. But he’s illegal. The whole situation breaks my heart, but the more I read, the more hopeless it sounds.

Before people go off on what a drain “illegal immigrants” are to our system, I would send you here: http://damnmexicans.blogspot.com/ – go read some of the sidebar info. It’s important. This child is already hard working. (yes, he does it with illegal papers) But just what does that mean? Well, it means he pays into our social security system and has taxes taken out, when he will never be able to file for a refund as would anyone else at his income level. It means he supports our commerce system, but gets the worst of both worlds. Taxation without representation, plus the constant worry of deportation.

Anyhow, I’m seeing an immigration attorney next week. I know I will probably end up paying for nothing but to be told the worst, but honestly the whole process is so confusing I just want to know what, if anything at all, we can do. I don’t usually get into politics on my blog, but – well, I just think that people need to hear circumstances like this, because it’s not something most of us think about. The first part of gaining acceptance is in realizing that people you know are affected. Speaking out is good.

The thing that strikes me the most is just how accepting and non-judgmental she was. She knew everyone in the community I was in, including the person I was trying to “rise from the ashes” from with my phoenix, and whether or not she had an opinion on my motives, I won’t ever know as she was a consummate professional. Both tattoos she did for me are creations that I cherish, and life experiences that I chose to permanently carry with me in ink.

I am looking for a Seattle photographer who would be willing to try to get some high quality images of the work she did on me, so that I can submit something to The Gypsy Jill Project. Whether it will be included or not, I don’t know, but I would like to offer something for inclusion. If you might be interested, please write me.